The present invention relates to a movable waiting station comprising a plurality of seating stations carried by a motorized movable structure adapted to cyclically take the various seating stations in correspondence with a service counter attended by an operator.
A movable waiting station of this type is known from U.S. Pat. No. 3,814,020 which discloses a conveyor system integrated in a building and intended to move people from an entry station to an exit station adjacent to a plurality of attended service counters. People entering in this waiting system can remain seated while queuing for their turn at one of the service counters. Although with a system of this type people can wait seated for their turn, the waiting time for queuing remains unproductive in that transactions between service personnel at the counters and service users take place only by direct contact between the user and the counter operator.
Non-attended service centres are known, provided with automatic apparatus which permit to carry out transactions, for instance bank transactions, without direct contact with service operators. One of such systems is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,600,114, which discloses a non-attended bank service centre electronically connected to a central banking system. The service centre comprises automatic machines provided with interactive terminals which allow the user to carry out different types of bank transactions. However, totally non-attended service centres of this type are accepted with difficulty from the service users which are traditionally used to the presence of a service operator which can assist them in carrying out the transactions.
In view of this state of the art, the object of the present invention is to provide a movable waiting station which allows the users to interact with a service operator and which permits to obtain a reduction of personnel attending the service counters by optimising work times.
According to the present invention, this object is achieved by an interactive movable waiting station having the features forming the subject of the main claim.